Half Life thread - Discussions about Valve's FPS magnum opus(es) and any related content (spin offs, expansions and etc)

[Deus Exica]

Any day... just any day now.. Valve will release the thing.... *COUGH*

Half Life only comes into being when Valve has tech to show off.

Anyway, I never want an actual explanation for G Man. Some mysteries should remain mysteries.

 

[Nameless One]

G-man's employers are the only mystery I'm open to them showing more of, but not completely solving. I want a Twin Peaks Black Lodge inspired sequence involving them.

 

[30+GameOvers]

G-man's employers are the only mystery I'm open to them showing more of, but not completely solving. I want a Twin Peaks Black Lodge inspired sequence involving them.
View attachment 7744853
View attachment 7744859

I like to think that G-Man is just some godlike dimension hopping schizo who does things for shits and giggles, and he has no "employers", they are just his excuse.
Or the Freeman's Mind explanation in that he just just a CIA spook with some really advanced technology, and there is a detachment of glowniggers uneffected by the Combine invasion sipping coffee and grooming vulnerable teens into committing terror acts for them like nothing happened.

 

[Star Classic]

G-man's employers are the only mystery I'm open to them showing more of, but not completely solving. I want a Twin Peaks Black Lodge inspired sequence involving them.
View attachment 7744853
View attachment 7744859

I'm hoping they're the overarching antagonists for the game, maybe even the series. I would like some conformation they exist at least. I never liked those theories about them not existing at all. I'm hoping The Combine are just the obstacles in the way, since a war with beings beyond our comprehension and the Combine's since they're pretty scared of them would be one-sided.

I'm hoping HLX includes killing/severely harming the Combine, with the rest of the game based on dealing with the G-man and his Employers since all bets are off because now the shared enemy is dead. Like Halo 3 did with the Flood.

I can see the employers trying to leave afterwards, so perhaps we go after the Employers to get something out of them raping our planet to kill the Combine, maybe bargaining with something to force them to not undo the cascade, but at least send aid to help the planet reform, at least enough aid to make sense why in Portal 2 earth looks so reformed.

I DON'T want to kill G-Man or his bosses. Even though G-man is pretty clearly the main antagonist in this game, him and his employers don't really strike me as "evil" just more opportunistic, its pretty clear that their goal is the same as ours, that being destroying the Combine.

I suppose if I was an interdimensional bureaucrat using a anthill (Earth) to kill a planet (Combine) seems like a pretty good deal to me, regardless of what the ants think.

Above all, just don't say what G-man is, the G-man being an Advisor is stupid. Him being anything is stupid.

 

[Deus Exica]

war with beings beyond our comprehension and the Combine's since they're pretty scared of them would be one-sided.

I prefer the idea that they're utterly beyond our scope and that the employers and combine proxy war will reach far beyond us, even after we deal with the combine that are left on Earth.

 

[Nameless One]

Its why I said Twin Peaks inspired. The Black Lodge are full of these chaotic supernatural beings responsible for tragedies and events in Twin Peaks.

"I am the Arm and this is what I sound like."
I think they can show the employers or their domain without letting you fight them, just as a creepy or terrifying sequence since HL has explored horror before. I see G-Man similar to MIKE from Twin Peaks, someone deeply connected to a greater force and the Employers being an Arm (the midget) figure possibly in control of their domain.

Chris Remo (a developer of Half Life Alyx) is a fan of Twin Peaks, just in case there's some surreal fuckery in HLX.

 

[Forklift Certified]

To be fair, surface tension/forget about freeman kind of apply to this.

Erre wrong...

Surface tension mainly outside map start with the dam - storm drain segment - cliff side - tank"water park" - nuke missile hangar - and ends with an other gargantuan fight... In between fighting inside "industrial" buildings

Forget about freeman mainly underground setting start with the tunnel collapse at an underground parking lot - short sewer section - tank motorbay fight and end with an other Akira elevator...

you see it's completely different settings with a distinguishable start point and ending, marked with "events"....

You would might be right if forget about freeman would start between the tank "water park" and the nuke missile level load...

Also I bet surface tension 4 times the size compared to forget about freeman...

The set piece transition between highway 17 and sand traps is a fucking boring tunnel... And the first half of the sand traps you doing the same thing as you done before at highway 17... Driving the buggy at the shorelines... (Then you walking at the shore line for the rest of the map)

If nova prospect started right after highway 17 that would be an OG hl1 stepiece transition... (Riding your buggy in the bridge ramming trough massive gates which is the only entry point for nova prospect Court yard)

 

[Star Classic]

Erre wrong...

Surface tension mainly outside map start with the dam - storm drain segment - cliff side - tank"water park" - nuke missile hangar - and ends with an other gargantuan fight... In between fighting inside "industrial" buildings

Forget about freeman mainly underground setting start with the tunnel collapse at an underground parking lot - short sewer section - tank motorbay fight and end with an other Akira elevator...

you see it's completely different settings with a distinguishable start point and ending, marked with "events"....

You would might be right if forget about freeman would start between the tank "water park" and the nuke missile level load...

Also I bet surface tension 4 times the size compared to forget about freeman...

The set piece transition between highway 17 and sand traps is a fucking boring tunnel... And the first half of the sand traps you doing the same thing as you done before at highway 17... Driving the buggy at the shorelines... (Then you walking at the shore line for the rest of the map)

If nova prospect started right after highway 17 that would be an OG hl1 stepiece translation... (Riding your buggy in the bridge ramming trough massive gates which is the only entry point for nova prospect Court yard)

I think it comes down to HL2's chapters being longer than HL1's, Surface Tension and On A Rail are outliers since most chapters are shorter, but in HL2 every other chapter is easily an hour long,

I think its meant to make it easier to access certain areas/levels. Does that mean that the feel/setting might end up the same as the last one? Yeah, but if a 4 second title and having the same setting is one of the biggest complaints about the chapter than I'd say its done pretty well.

I will never complain about HL2 doing that after playing Black Mesa Blue Shift, Focal Point felt like 2/3 different chapters meshed into one.

 

[Star Classic]

I prefer the idea that they're utterly beyond our scope and that the employers and combine proxy war will reach far beyond us, even after we deal with the combine that are left on Earth.

I'm not opposed to the series being like Roadside Picnic with the Employers/Combine coming and going leaving us to pick up the pieces. But I also feel that the series has always been about overcoming insurmountable odds, especially in the episodes & Alyx.

 

[Honka Honka Burning Love]

G-man's employers are the only mystery I'm open to them showing more of

It's Future Gordon Freeman who has G-man deposit 100 dollars in a compounding interest bank account.

 

[Forklift Certified]

Does that mean that the feel/setting might end up the same as the last one? Yeah, but if a 4 second title and having the same setting is one of the biggest complaints about the chapter than I'd say its done pretty well.

To reflect to the original post which started this detour between G-man dick riding ...

After ravenholme this makes the hl2 settings mid at best (and personally in my opinion a bit tedious as well)

But you are right hl2 maps way bigger... I wonder which way valve going to steer the set design at a supposed hl3...

 

[crowabunga]

G-man's employers are the only mystery I'm open to them showing more of, but not completely solving. I want a Twin Peaks Black Lodge inspired sequence involving them.
View attachment 7744853
View attachment 7744859

If the employers were featured I'd be happy with Twin Peaks occult surrealism, but I'd also be fine if they played into big sci-fi tropes like Epistle 3 did with the Combine, but up to 11: if the Combine are harvesting the energies of entire stars but are still a "normal" material civilisation, then for the G-man's parent civilisation pull something out of an Alastair Reynolds book and have the "employers" be an ancient superintelligence or the gestalt of a primordial civilisation running on a neutron star or black hole computer, something that even if superficially "explained" would retain mystique.

 

[PanLake007]

Half-Life 2 was released 2004, I'm surprised people still care that much, I lost interest in a sequel ~10 years ago. With the current state of AAA I wouldn't expect anything at all. I hope it has aim down sights.

"Half-Life 2 was the first game to require Steam for installation and authentication at launch on November 16, 2004, making it the inaugural title to mandate the platform regardless of whether it was purchased digitally or via retail copy." I remember, me with super slow internet.